Rigoletto to conclude Met series

PRESS RELEASE

UNIVERSITY OF CENTRAL ARKANSAS

COLLEGE OF FINE ARTS AND COMMUNICATION

January 29, 2013

CONTACT: Donna Lampkin Stephens, (501) 450-3406; donnals@uca.edu

RIGOLETTO TO CONCLUDE MET SERIES AT UCA

CONWAY — A new production of Rigoletto will conclude the 2012-13 season of Captured Live from the Met @ UCA at 2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 17, in the Donald W. Reynolds Performance Hall on the University of Central Arkansas campus.

Director Michael Mayer has placed his new production of Verdi’s towering tragedy in Las Vegas in 1960. Piotr Beczala is the womanizing Duke, Željko Lucic is his tragic sidekick, Rigoletto, and Diana Damrau is Rigoletto’s daughter, Gilda.

According to www.metoperafamily.org, approximate running time for the performance is three hours, two minutes. Las Vegas is “the ideal setting for this eternal conflict of depravity and innocence.”

Michele Mariotti conducts. The opera is sung in Italian with Met titles in English, German and Spanish.

Rigoletto is the final of fourhigh definition transmissions of Metropolitan Opera performances in the series sponsored by UCA’s College of Fine Arts and Communication.

This is the seventh season of the Met’s series, which came to UCA in 2008. According to the Met, it has expanded its worldwide distribution to 1,900 theaters in 60 countries, the largest global audience the initiative has ever reached. Ecuador, Guatemala, India, Jamaica, Madagascar, and Qatar joining the HD distribution network for the first time. To accommodate audience demand this season, dozens more cinemas have been added in Germany, Mexico, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

Joyce DiDonato, Renée Fleming, Susan Graham, Eric Owens, Sondra Radvanovsky and Deborah Voigt serve as hosts for the Live in HD presentations this season, conducting live interviews with cast, crew, and production teams, and introducing the popular behind-the-scenes interviews and features.

Approximately 200 seats are available for each performance at UCA. General admission tickets are $15 for the public and $5 for students with valid I.D.